Day Plans are plan drawings of each excavation area made in GIS at the end of every day of work. They should show 1) what contexts were closed that day (including spatial contexts and approximate contexts), 2) everything that is currently visible in the area (e.g., stones, mudbrick deposits, pits, walls, etc.), and 3) selected depths and elevations. Day Plans are invaluable for helping later project participants understand how an area was excavated. They are also helpful in the short-term, as they are included in Evernote and annotated to illustrate the following day of excavation and are also included in project and Ministry representative reports.
In the GeoPackage for each excavation area are the project file (.qgz) and layers to be used for both day planning and archival recording (See here for more on setting up a new GeoPackage):
- [EA]_day_plan_annotations_[year]: an annotation layer to be modified according to the needs of each new day plan
- [EA]_day_plan_elevation_points_[year]: a point layer for day-plan illustration of individual points showing top or bottom elevations (derived from DEMs from photobatches or from GNSS measurements) and feature heights and depths (derived from DEM or GNSS measurements)
- [EA]_day_plan_lines_[year]: a line layer for day-plan illustration of outlines, continuations, reconstructions, and profiles
- [EA]_day_plan_polygons_[year]: a polygon layer for day-plan illustration of areas of interest, bioturbation, burning, or disturbance; and features of bedrock, ceramic, earthen or stone material
- [EA]_context_spatial_polygons: a polygon layer for both day-plan and archival illustration of the 2D extents of all spatial contexts
- [EA]_context_approximate_points: a point layer for both day-plan and archival illustration of the point locations of all approximate contexts
- [EA]_context_illustration_polygons: a multi-part polygon layer for archival illustration of spatial contexts, in which each record is used for only one material or area (e.g., ceramic, earthen, stone; burning, bioturbation) of one spatial context
- [EA]_context_illustration_lines: a line layer for archival illustration of spatial contexts, in which each record is used for only one type of line associated with one spatial context
As mentioned elsewhere, the raster orthophotos and DEMs associated with each excavation area are stored in a separate folder, named by timestamp with prefix P for orthophotos and Z for DEMs.
Making a Day Plan #
The following workflow is suggested for the creation of Day Plans (follow the links or proceed to the following pages for detailed descriptions).